Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-11-27
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.

No more unique, distinctive, ard at the
same time populsr character stands before
the people to-day than Ella Wheeler
Wilcox.
Born in q Wisconsin village some thirty
odd years ago, when Wisconsin was not
much more than frontier state, without
Influential friends or family, and without
money, she made for herself q name in
literature which commanded attention
before she was eighteen years old. To
one who knows it in detail her history
reads ike fairy story. Reared on q
western prairie, she is an ornament to
the most brilliant circles Of the metrop-
oils
She had never seen an editor CT literary
person and knew nothing Of the methods
Of getting into print when, at fourteenj
she read her first production to the press.
The New York Mercury published these
childish efforts which We're written in
prose and under nom de-plumes.
It declined the first poem she ever sent
for publication, and the editor sarcastic
sllv advised her to 'fCrush her ambitions
to be poet"
The WsverIy Magazine has the honor
10 be the first to present the name Of Ellie
Wheeler to the public.
Frank Leslie sent her the first check
she ever received ct seventeen years OF
age.
From that time to the present day she
has never swerved nor faltered in the
ste&dy, hard climb towSrd success.
She never sent manuscript IN her life
for criticism a5d never asked for aid or
iDflueCce in her literary ventures.
During the last fifteen years Ella
Wheeler has probably been the most crit
icised, atused, praised, misconstrued and
admired woman in TIE literary world.
Without particle Of effort to create 6
sensation, everything she has in that
time written has had the effect of stirring
up criticism.
Her writings seem 10 be possessed of q
certain something combustible in their
composition, that on striking outer air
invariably rends it with more or less OF
en- explosion.
Her first published book was "DrOps OF
Water" a collection Of juvenile temper
snce verses. These were crude but filed
with the dramatic enthusiasm which has sc
permeated her later work, and provoked
praise and censure in proportiouate guam
titles from the contending forces on the
lia1Gr, question.
Saeffs,n q little volume now out Of
print, comes next.
"Maurinne," by many considered her
finest work, and the famous Poems of
Passion which set the literary world on
fire, followed within three years Of each
other.
Columns Of abuse and praise items rid
iculipg and eulosiZing the latter volume
filed sill the papers il the country.
Some of her friends urged her to sup
press the book after its first appearance,
out strong in the courage of her convic-
tons, she read the severe and unjust re-
views through tears, not unmixed with
smiles ct sight of the golden coins which
punctuEted the comments of the critics.
Msny Of these dollars were spent in
building home for aging parents, and
much Of the halo now surrounding this
remarkable woman's life is the re election
OF the generous deeds Of her early monled
life.
Milwaukee people gave her "bene fit'i
in MAY, 1888, when she wss made the sub
ject OF q speech by q United States Sens
Tor and wss presented with china basket
containing $500 in gold.
Long before her happy marriage in May
1884, with the elegant and cultivated gen
tleman who brought her TO the east, hel
nane was household word and she was
", leone guest in the best circles of the
greS northeast.
To her rare genius were added unusual
graces of person. She was q brilliant
and tactful talxer, a good dancer, and q